Soundless Voices

I never wanted these powers. I never wanted to be different from everyone else. If I could, I would do anything. I’d give anything up. Everything if I could. Just so I wouldn’t have this curse. This burden to bear. These powers have done nothing but caused me pain. They have taken away everyone I’ve ever loved. My family, my friends, even my very existence. I’m nothing but a monster and it’s all because...of my own selfishness. It’s all my fault. If I could go back, back to that moment when everything started to go wrong, then none of this would have happened. This wouldn’t be happening to me. I wouldn’t have to suffer anymore. But now...it’s too late. It’s far too late for anything to change. No matter how much the world advances and discoveries are made, a fundamental fact will remain the same. The dead cannot come back to life. Humans do not have the power over life and death. Only God does, but even then, we try our hands at things we shouldn’t touch. We do things that disturb the very balance of nature in order to satisfy our own desires. We are selfish, cruel and no longer kind. 

I remember the accident as if it happened just yesterday. Just moments ago. The memory of it is so vivid. The experience of it is so surreal and just by remembering that event, I die over and over again once more. It was because of that accident I lost someone whom I cared for very dearly. Someone who meant the whole world to me and should have been the one to live instead of me. Part of me died in that accident and what remains is a hollow shell of a body that only keeps moving by sheer willpower. I will myself to keep on walking forward to find out what really happened that day. 11 years ago I was involved in a fatal car crash with my brother. I just barely survived, but the cost of my life was that of my brother, and the cost of that wish were these inhumane powers. Not all wishes are good and even if they are, most of them don’t come true. Even if by some strange miraculous reason they do, there’s always a price one must pay. The price for my selfish wish was the death of my big brother and what I was rewarded with is something a human being should never be able to possess. 

When I awoke from the comma, I was told that a year had passed since the accident. At first I didn’t understand what they meant. Everything around me felt strange and different. It felt as if I was asleep for just a short while. Like I just awoke from an afternoon nap. Coming to terms with the time, date and year is unexplainable. It didn’t feel real. Nothing did. The last thing I remember was being in the car with my brother and we had a huge argument. We said hurtful words to each other. Words that we didn’t mean, but I said something that never should have been said and just when I wanted to take it back, everything went black. It was all blank. I couldn’t remember anything after that. What happened after that truck was coming towards us and we went over the railing and plunged into darkness? I don’t know. Where am I? How long was I out for? What did I dream about again? I couldn’t remember anything and didn’t know what was happening other than the fact that I was all alone in that darkness and the sheer thought of that terrified me.

My brother was no longer with us. They told me right after I almost attacked a nurse. I went hysterical after that. My brother was gone and he was never coming back. I never understood death and I never wanted to. It was too difficult for a mere 7 year old to understand. The concept of life and death was just so abstract, but just the same, it was easy enough to be understood. The dead cannot come back. No matter how long I sat in front of that grave, waiting for him in his room on the bed, he wasn’t coming. He wasn’t going to crush me in a hug and apologize over and over again that he was sorry. That it was all a sick joke. My brother was dead and a part of me wished that this was all just a terrible dream. A nightmare, but it wasn’t and the sheer thought of this being reality made me even more scared than the fear of the crash and falling. 

The first time I realized that something was wrong was when I woke up. My earrings were ringing with a sharp piercing sound. It was like someone was making a loud whistling sound. The pain was deadly and it felt as if my head was going to split any minute. There were too many voices talking. All at once and were so confusing. Nothing was making sense and everything sounded like a bunch of jargle nonsense. I was never fond of people. Nor then being in swarms of big crowds. All those eyes looking my way. Their gazes were shooting daggers at me. Their words hurt me. Their judgmental views were scary and that’s why I hid behind me brother. He would protect me. I would always see him standing in front of me with that big broad back. He was my own superhero that would always be there for me whenever I needed him. Always and forever. But it seems that there is no such thing as eternity for us human beings. We all eventually die not knowing when and are kept in fear everyday. Living out our lives to the full extent possible. Knowing that eventually it will all be taken away someday. I never knew that someday was right now. If I did, I never would have treated you that way. I never wanted to hurt you. So please just come back and say that everything's okay. That we can go back to how things were. Please big brother.  

I told them to stop. To stop talking all in once. Their voices amplified and varied. What are they saying? What is going on? I just told all of you to stop. Just stop. “Just shut the hell up!” then everything went silent. So silent you could hear a pin drop. It lasted for only 5 seconds before someone said something. People don’t know when to just keep their mouths shut. “I told you stop talking!” “...Logan. No one said anything.” A voice said. More voices started talking other than that voice. Voices which sounded different. “They are talking! I hear them!” I opened my eyes and I was surrounded by people. All peering down at me like I was a specimen. I could totally understand the feeling of animals in a zoo. The feeling of being trapped in a cage and looked at from all sides. No privacy. No personal space. Looked at all the time. 24 hours in a day. With no time to breathe or escape from their gaze. “Logan...I’m the only one talking.” a doctor from my side. I was in the hospital and I needed to leave right away. I hated the hospital and doctors. They were all a pain. They were scary and I hated the shoots they gave. The voices still kept on talking. I could hear it in their voice that they were scared. Of who? Of me? Why? I was the one who was scared of them. What can a child do to make them go away?

“They’re still talking.” “Kiddo only the doc’s talking. Well right now I am too. Are you sure you’re feeling okay son?” a voice said to my other side. I knew that voice. It belonged to my father and that’s when I realized that something was wrong. Very wrong. “Maybe we should let him rest a bit more.” “I agree. He did just wake up not long ago, but he’s got so much energy in him.” The voices started to grow louder once again and I just stared at the people around me. “Son, what’s wrong? You’re as white as a sheet. Doctor are you sure he’s okay?” You wouldn’t be okay if you were me. If you were my age and what you saw, no, what you heard. You wouldn’t be able to handle it right away. No one could. Not even me. I started to scream and the voices grew louder. I covered my ears. “Make it all go away. Make it stop. It’s hurting me!” I screamed. “Lucas! What is?! What’s wrong?!” “The voices! The voices! It’s too loud. Danny help me! Where’s my brother?! Danny! They’re hurting me!” Everything was loud. It was all too bright. The lights were fading in and out. The world was turning and merging and then I saw my brother standing. Daniel was standing right in front of me in all this chaos. How was he okay in all this chaos. My vision started to blur and my brother started to fade. “Danny.” I said in a quiet voice and reached out a sore hand. He smiled a sad smile and said without moving his lips, “Everything's going to be alright, Lukey. I’ll always be with you. I swear. Now—” “Sleep.” We said in unison and I did. Not knowing when I’d wake ever again. 

Time started to pass, but not for me. 6 months was all I needed with weekly therapies to convince the doctors and my father that I was alright. But I knew that I never would be. I had to pretend so I could get out and leave. I wanted to go home and see Danny, even though I knew he wouldn’t be there. But I still hoped. I still prayed. I still wanted to believe that everything they said was all a lie. I didn’t want to hear their voices. The ones on the outside and the inside. I didn’t want to hear anything. In those 6 months I figured out what was wrong with me. Scientifically I was diagnosed as having Hyperacusis. A hearing disorder where certain sounds may seem unbearably loud even though people around you don’t seem to notice them. It was probably a result of the accident. Okay fair. I can now hear certain sounds that normally people can’t. When I woke up, words and thoughts merged. I couldn’t make anything out or tell one from the other. I can hear sounds that ordinary people can’t. I can hear voices that shouldn't be heard. I can hear the inner voices of those around me. Their thoughts. There were dark and ugly voices. Cruel and unkind. Sometimes they were the opposite, but the fact didn’t change. I lost my brother in that crash and I miraculously survived, but the cost of my life and the burden I needed to bear, was to hear the hidden voices of the people around me. Voices that are private and not meant to be heard. I have the key to the hearts of every human on this planet, but I never wanted it. I wanted to throw it away. 

I knew it was not natural to hear one’s thoughts. I had a power that was only known to be in comic books. The power to hear voices. Voices not heard under normal circumstances. I don’t know why and I don’t know how. All I know is, I never wanted it and now that I have it, I can never live an ordinary life. The inner voices are loud. It’s like when your brain takes in a flood of information and feels heavy. Like there’s a heavy boulder weighing you down. It’s like a bad headache, only it never goes away. I don’t want to hear those inner thoughts, but it’s like you accidentally overhear a loud conversation. Even if you don’t want to, it just happens. I have no choice. No say. I have to hear their thoughts and pretend that everything's okay. My brother always called me his good luck charm. Whenever he went for his baseball games, I’d get dragged along too, even if I didn’t want to go because of the crowd and everything was too loud, I still went anyway because of what Danny said, “Lukey, you gotta always be with me okay? You’re my good luck charm and I’m always gonna win with you there.” True enough to his words my brother always did. I believed I brought good luck and that’s what I always said to our parents. “I’m Danny’s good luck charm and he won because of me!” “He sure did.” “It’s all cause of you, you little squirt.” “Hurray!” It’s laughable really. I was sure one heck of a good luck charm. I even killed my brother so how am I a good luck charm. I brought nothing but bad luck. 

In that one year, where I was asleep, a lot’s changed. My brother was no longer with us, and neither was my mother. My mother though, her betrayal was something I never expected. She adored my brother. I knew he was her favorite kid. After the accident my mother went mad. She went so crazy that she needed to blame someone. She had to take out her anger on someone. Anyone and that person was me. She hated me. She detested me to the point where she wanted to pull the plug when I was at the death door. I half had the nerve to ask her to do it. I could see my brother a lot faster if she did. The other half though just wanted to know why? Was I not her son too? Was I also not in pain? I lost someone who was precious to me too, so, why did you want to kill me? I was her son too, so then why? I will never be able to ask her because, after that stunt she pulled my parents separated. The last time I ever saw mom was during Danny’s anniversary and that was a bloodbath. Now that I can hear inner voices, I knew that the mother I knew and loved was no longer there and I could never get her back...Dad met someone during that time and after a while they got together. I have two younger siblings now, but I won’t ever consider them in that way. I only had one sibling. I only had one big brother. Daniel Walker will and always be my only big brother. I sometimes still think he’s alive. Out there somewhere. If I got these powers to hear the thoughts of others, then maybe he got something too. Even after all these years, I wanted to believe Danny was alive and we will find each other one day, but I don’t know how long I can keep this farce up. I’m starting to catch up with time and I don’t know how long I can wait for him before I start to break even further. 

I’m 18 and in university now. I started to live by myself after graduating. I didn’t want to live in that house anymore and I could hear the inner voice of my dad’s new wife, that she didn’t really like me much, but still kept up the act of being a caring stepmom. How hypocritical. I didn’t run into my mom ever again. I heard that she got remarried and still came to visit my brother’s grave from time to time. I can’t even begin to describe how messed up everything's been ever since the accident. Coping with this curse was not easy, but I made it work. I woke up from my thoughts as I saw the professor packing up. Class was over and the students were leaving the lecture hall. I didn’t hear anything that a normal person could because I was wearing noise canceling headphones. I started learning to read the lips of people so I wouldn’t have to hear their inner voices. It was too much to take in and I didn’t want to rely on this power. I headed out of the class and walked in a daze, not making eye contact with those around me when all of a sudden I bumped into someone and my headphones were knocked off from my head. So were the books I was carrying. I grimaced as a flood of outer and inner voices rushed into my eardrums. “Are you okay?” a voice said amongst all the noise. It must have belonged to the attacker, ahem. I meant the person who bumped into me. Or I could have too, not sure. “I’m fine.” I said waving my hand. “Are you sure?” the voice asked. There was a hint of a mocking tone as the two of us were bent down to pick my stuff up. I scrambled to get my headphone’s when he beat me to it. “I said I was fine. Now stop talking to me and give me back my headphones.” “Is that so...I didn’t say anything though.” I froze. A cold chill ran down my spine when I started to realize that I was able to tune out all the other voices in the background and was only able to hear his. I looked up at him and he gave me a smile that was anything but friendly. He didn’t move his lips, but I heard his inner voice. “It’s nice to meet you Lucas Walker. I heard you have great hearing. Can I get some of your thoughts on that?”